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Students of communications professor Georgine Hodgkinson were challenged April 2 to recite 11 historical speeches significant to the women's rights movements.
The speeches touched on a wide range of issues, from women's voting rights and equal opportunity in the workplace to abortion legalization and women in the government.
"Sometimes we forget it wasn't that long ago that women were second-class citizens," said Hodgkinson, who organized the event. She said it was important to understand the historical context of the women's rights movements.
The speeches, chosen by the students, spanned a period of 129 years from the beginnings of the women's suffrage movement with Elizabeth Cady Stanton's 1848 speech "Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions" to the more modern "Let Us Join Hearts And Minds" speech by Rosalyn Yalow in 1977.
Psychology major Ashleigh Stayton, 20, chose to perform Sojourner Truth's 1867 Address to the American Equal Rights Association, in which the former slave spoke for women's rights.
"I just felt it was a powerful speech," Stayton said. "She was a very influential person in that time."
The focus of the event moved from women's voting rights in the 19th century to the late '60s movement in favor of abortion legalization and finally to the subject of women in office in the '70s.
One of the speeches featured at the event focused on female college students.
"When a young woman graduates from college and starts looking for a job," said Shirley Chisholm in her 1969 speech which was performed Thursday by Christina A. Otto, "she is likely to have a frustrating and even demeaning experience ahead of her."
Chisholm, who was the first black Congresswoman, said in her original speech that too few women occupied positions of importance relative to their real numbers.
Audience members laughed and nodded when Michael Phu, reciting a 1972 speech by Bella Abzug, declared that the women's rights movement was more than bra burning.
One speaker, Leckesia Pablo, wore African garb during her rendition of the 1873 Susan B. Anthony speech "Women's Right To Vote".
Social science major Daniel Sagan, 22, co-hosted the event after approaching Hodgkinson with the idea.
"The Women's History Month Planning Committee didn't have a lot of funding," he said. "We had to come up with events that financially made sense."
Sagan said usually speakers would be paid to come in but this time, he "wanted students to be active in an event."
Audience members, some of whom were there for class credit or had been brought by friends, were asked to rate the performances.
Clinical nutrition major Vincent Leung, 19, said he attended after being asked by a friend and thought the event was "well informed."
Others clapped, cheered, or listened quietly during the performance.
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